Context
Meet JCM Power
JCM Power is a Toronto-headquartered independent power producer founded in 2009[…]. It is owned by five development finance institutions, including FinDev Canada (Canada's federal Crown corporation for emerging-market investment), STOA Infra & Energy (France), and Swedfund (Sweden)[…][…]. The ownership profile shapes the strategy. JCM is not chasing the highest-IRR markets. It is structured to operate where development outcomes and risk-adjusted returns intersect.
200+ MW
Operating capacity
Solar and wind, across three continents
543,394
MWh delivered to Malawi
First two years, Salima + Golomoti
~10%
Of Malawi's grid power
Now supplied by JCM
$0.031/kWh
Pakistan tariff bid
240 MW hybrid PV-wind, 2024
Malawi: the operating track record
The 60 MW Salima Solar PV plant came online in late 2021. The 20 MW Golomoti plant followed in 2022, paired with a 5 MW battery. Golomoti was the first utility-scale grid-connected solar-plus-storage project in Sub-Saharan Africa[…]. Together they supply roughly a tenth of Malawi's grid power. JCM self-performs operations and maintenance on both sites.
The chili pepper hedge
JCM faced a problem in Malawi familiar to anyone operating in frontier currencies. The company gets paid in kwacha. Capital costs and debt service are denominated in dollars. JCM's response: invest a portion of kwacha revenue into community farms growing African bird's-eye chili peppers, which are sold internationally for US dollars. The model funds local livelihoods and partially hedges JCM's FX exposure at the same time[…]. The kind of operating creativity required to make frontier markets bankable is not in JCM's pitch deck. It is in JCM's vegetable patch.
JCM's prior Nigeria experience and how this proposal differs is the subject of the next two slides.